Review of What the English Call Bacon

Last week I traveled to England for my brother’s wedding. I had never been there before and was not sure what to expect. I knew they drive on the left side of the road, call police Bobbies, and eat beans for breakfast, but I didn’t know the answer to the most important question of them all. What is English bacon like?

When I checked out the local cafés and pubs I found something that you never seem to find in the U.S. There was bacon everywhere: bacon and eggs sandwiches, BLTs, bacon baguettes, bacon flavored crisps, and bacon and toast. My mouth was watering just looking at the menus.

I went to a café for my first taste of English bacon. I got the classic English breakfast that consisted of: 2 eggs, 2 sausages, 2 strips of bacon, beans, black pudding, toast, and a cup of tea. The waiter set it down in front of me and my heart sank. There next to my eggs were two large strips of what can only be described as ham. That’s right, it was none other than the dreaded back bacon.

I couldn’t believe it. I asked some of the locals about this and they told me that back bacon was “proper bacon.” To which I said “there is nothing proper about this.” It was like I was in my own private hell. So I went on a quest to find pork belly.

I went to a bunch of different places and with each order my hatred for the England grew. But the thing that pushed me over the edge was when I ordered a BLT. It came with lettuce, tomato, and two large slices of back bacon. When I started to force it down, I realized it was missing one key ingredient, mayonnaise.

I walked up to the counter and asked for some and was told that they didn’t have any. All they had was ketchup and brown sauce (a blown liquid that tastes like a sweet A1 sauce that the Brits seem to put on everything).

As I think back to history class and the reasons for the American Revolution, (oppression, and taxation without representation) and can’t help but think I was lied to. The real reason the states wanted to break free from British rule was pork bellies and mayo. No longer did the colonies want to eat mayo-less back bacon sandwiches. As I did more research into the subject I found that the original plan for the Boston tea party was to throw pigs overboard to show their outrage. But it was decided that the pigs never did anything to harm them and it would have been a waste of precious pork belly. So they decided that since only Brits, women, and girly men drank tea (real men drink coffee) they would use it to get their point across and the rest is history.

British Bacon is the same as Danish and Irish. I guess you might compare it to Ham, but for us in the UK its very different. Ham in the Uk is quite thin compared to the UK version of Bacon and we wouldn’t fry our version of Ham. I am looking forward to trying some proper american bacon on my trip over.

Thankfully, we Brits aren’t stuck in a world of back bacon – next time you’re over here, ask for streaky bacon instead, which is the good stuff. (Most BLTs here use streaky – I’m sorry you happened upon an aberrant version.)

If you find yourself in a British supermarket, keep an eye out for dry-cured smoked streaky (available pretty much everywhere), or my favourite, a wet-cured treacle one from Waitrose. Lots of butchers cure their own too; the situation is not as dire as you think!

One difference I have noticed is that bacon in the US is more likely to be cooked to a crisp. Here in the UK, we seem to tend towards a crisp edge, but don’t crisp the whole slice. It’s still wonderful stuff.

I’m from the UK, but am traveling the states at the moment and have to say that I much prefer our British bacon. American bacon is far more fatty-looking and you get way less bacon for your buck compared to back home.

Bread is a weird one here too. It’s all very sugary tasting. Some other things I’ve noticed include:

American biscuit = British scone (but a savory version)
American zucchini = British courgette
American cilantro = British coriander

Actually the wierdest thing about cheap/average priced american bread is how long it stays fresh without going moldy… bread in the US can last 2-3 weeks, bread in the UK is likely to last 5 days in comparison.

I’m sorry for the experience you had. However, it is always proper to know the terms the locals call things. Back bacon IS bacon in the UK and streaky bacon is what the UK calls our bacon. I personally prefer theirs and wish I could find it locallly. UK culture is different than ours. We are an I WANT IT MY WAY society. Maybe we should learn to have it their way when we are in their country. BTW: The tea party was over taxation, not culinary preference. Next time you go, maybe you should seek out a Buger King and have it your way.

I’m sorry you didn’t like our bacon. Clearly you need to develop better taste buds. Our bacon is lush. You can only eat yours when it is burnt to a crisp as it is virtually all fat. Now eating fat has its place (if you come back ask for a bag of pork scratching) but you can’t beat a nice piece of smoked bacon. And no it doesn’t taste like ham at all, which is best boilet (in coke) and then roasted) yum. Oh and Liz when you say that most places here use streaky bacon for BLT’s that is simply not true. There may be a small amount of fat on the bacon but not to the extent you get it in the US. I would agree though that mayonaise does taste good on BLT’s

As A Brit living In the US I have to say I am very disappointed in the food, I buy fresh meat and veg and cook English things like shepherds pie yorkshire puddings etc my husband loves it. We go to store that sells food from other countries, there we buy Heinze baked beans, Branston pickle, oxo cubes and some other things. It costs a lot but American beans are horrible and always have something in them.
The bread here is sweet.far to sweet I have to use marmalade to take away the taste, although that is sweet it has a sharpeness to it. NOW THE BACON….its horrid..its all fat and YES you do have to cook it to a crisp to get rid of the fat, I rarely eat it. American cheese is like processed cheese and its orange, I buy swiss cheese to get a nicer taste. They seem to smoke everything here or put sugar or something it.there is no such thing as just food as is.

Anne,
You’re right a lot of American food is processed with tons of sugar and salt. If you want food that isn’t you have to pay a little more.
I very much enjoyed British food, it was like good home cooking. Steak and kidney pudding was amazing but sadly you don’t find that on many menus here. In the states we look at things like sausage and mash as unhealthy but have no problem pound down countless tons of deep fried potatoes.
Yes a lot of bacon here is nothing but fat. That’s because it is cheaper for restaurants to use subpar bacon and sadly we just accept it. There are some high quality bacons that have just the right amount of fat, but once again its going to cost you.
On of our missions here at Mr. Baconpants is to build awareness of the higher quality bacon and to refuse to eat the burnt thin strips of fat some places call bacon, I’m looking at you burger king.
Thanks for posting if you have anymore experiences with bacon, good or bad, let us know.

I have to say I hate American bread, very sugary, just not the same. Been in the US for 20 years and won’t eat the bread though I have found sugar free wheat bread by natures own that I will eat, and it will be a bacon sarnie with brown sauce….mmmmmm

It’s all about what you grew up with. I grew up in Australia with back and middle (similar) bacon. When I moved to the US I was horrified with the bacon here. When you’re used to back bacon you don’t think it’s like ham at all. This is like comparing some old lady’s boiled sweets to some amazing confection from a high end chocolatier just because they are both made primarily out of sugar.

I don’t enjoy the taste or texture of American bacon at all. It’s either cooked so crisply that it shatters into a thousand pieces if you touch it with a fork or it’s tough like strips of denim.

Back bacon is what is called proper bacon is most other countries where they really know how to enjoy good food. The American style bacon you’re thinking of isn’t that popular in other countries because it isn’t that good.

That streaky, 60% fat riddled gristly rubbish Americans call bacon is NOT bacon – the nerve of this article to
not only compare it to proper bacon, but to then say that it is the ‘proper’
bacon!!! Brit/Rest of world bacon – the one that actually has some meat
on it, is bacon. End of.

Have to give the author fair play though, he at least TRIED actual
proper bacon, thus his opinion is based on first hand experience and
thus is valid – which is a lot more than most people will do before jumping to defensive mode. I like a lot of things about the states, but the food is too full of sugars, fats and additives – and the bacon is amongst the worst – more fat than meat, badly cooked and crumbly/crusty. No taste whatsoever.

But I guess the point is that you grow up so used to something lousy, that you don’t want to switch is true..

Mr Baconpants, what a wanker you are.
The word derives originally from the Old High German “bacho”, meaning “buttock”, which in turn derived from the Proto-Germanic “backoz”, meaning “back”. By the 14th century, it found its way into Old French as “bacun”, meaning “back meat”. And by the 16th century, it found its way into Middle English as “bacoun” We invented the word bacon in England. We’ll decide what it is, thanks. Did any of your descendants even live in America in the 16th century? Bacon is loved loved loved in England. Whatever you try and pass for bacon in your arrogant land of stupid people, give it another name. Imagination=0.

Just want to say your comment about tea was completly wrong. Most popular drink in the World besides water is tea. Only reason why hot tea is not number one in America is because the British and the revolution.

The Romans got it all started by curing pork shoulders into a form of bacon but it was the English/Brits that have along with their colonized brethren the Canadian’s and the Australian’s who perfected the taste/texture of real back bacon using a few different curing methods/cuts, achieving world class results.

May I suggest to the author that not-unlike the wonderful diversities of all peoples throughout the world, we also have diversities in bacon.

Dry cure, wet cure, smoked, green, belly pork, side pork, back pork.

Rather than knocking every type/style of bacon eaten around the world while bragging up your US type of bacon that predominately uses pork bellies to make bacon, (Very tasty bacon I would admit)

May I suggest though, that you try to make an effort like most Americans should try to make critical effort to be more open minded or worldly, and less critical of everything non- American.

American’s if they really want to stop being disliked by most of the world for their brash arrogance/ignorance about the world they live in might start trying to be more open minded, inclusive rather than being so divisively ignorant and negative about all things that are not “”Made In the USA””.

If you have read any history about the worlds great explorers, warriors, hunters, tribesmen, bushmen, inuit, which I doubt you have you would have learned that the toughest most resilient peoples of the world who live and endure is some of the worlds harshest climates drank/drink tea.

I’m a little puzzled that you’d write British bacon off as ham and I’m kinda surprised that you encountered so much brown sauce; I suspect you got tourist serving. But since moving out here 10 years ago, I struggle with the American notion of bacon. It’s fat with bits of meat. Back bacon, having a pork-chop like attachment of meat has a lot more versatility. If you turn the heat up a bit, cook it at 450-475f, it’ll come out like a broad slab of American bacon. Cook it lower – 410f for me – and it’s soft and chewy, like a good jerky, but warm and moist. The next challenge, though, is to find your treatment: Saltiness, degree of smoking, cured or uncured. Frankly, most restaurants in England use the cheap stuff for the english breakfast, something that blends well the rest of the plate rather than standing out from it. You have to find a restaurant that promotes it’s “Bacon Sarnie” (bacon + optional sauce + bread).

The best bacon in the world is English. The worst I think is Australian. It always reminds me of a piece of shiny, floppy plastic. It refuses to cook properly and turns black before it gets crispy.
Lord only knows what they do to it.

The puffing, strutting, distinctly “continental” outrage on these comments is hilarious.

He. was. making. a. joke. This is a joke page. It’s not serious. He’s not threatening your national bacon preferences, you idiotic limeys. Calm the fuck down. Or calm your bollocks. Whichever version makes you less enraged.

To anybody who’s eaten properly cooked (i.e – crispy but not hard, slightly flexible but not rubbery) porkbelly bacon for any length of time, back bacon simply tastes like a piece of ham. There’s no way around it. The consistency is vastly different, largely because it’s cut VASTLY thicker than Americans are used to. The fat content is another issue, but not the primary issue. And no, it’s not because all Americans are morbidly obese and hate things that aren’t full of fat. Please refer to the first sentence of this post, and also examine your own culinary staples, all of which are LOADED with animal fat.

If we wanted a piece of “British bacon”, we’d buy a cured, smoked ham and cut a 1cm piece off and fry it. We DO have ham here as well, although we tend to cut that very thinly as well.